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Cover Quote: March 1977

What kind of crazy symbol is this, which means nothing at all? Is it a digit, or isn’t it? 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 all stand for numbers one can understand and grasp—but 0? If it is nothing, then it should be nothing. But sometimes it is nothing, and then at other times it is something; 3 + 0 = 3 and 3 − 0 = 3, so here the zero is nothing, it is not expressed, and when it is placed in front of a number it does not change it: 03 = 3, so the zero is still nothing, nulla figura! But write the zero after a number, and it suddenly multiplies the number by ten: 30 = 3 × 10. So now it is something—something incomprehensible but powerful, if a few “nothings” can raise a small number to an immeasurably vast magnitude. Who could understand such a thing?



- Karl Menninger
Number Words and Number Symbols, 1958
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